stretchstretch

QUOTE(greg775 @ Aug 22, 2006 -> 08:51 PM) Like fathom said, I'm IN. There are no signs of coming out of this since none of our starters are guaranteed to shut teams down and come up with wins like last year. This year, it's Det's starters. I'm in, but people here have to stop talking about pitching being THE issue and our offense to be daunting when we continually lack the capability to jump on someone for 3 runs in the 1st or come from 4 down to make it a game. I live in CA and was having lunch today with a friend from Chgo and a Cub fan, he was talking about being at the 14-10 Cub win in gm 3 and even though the Cubs were putting up big runs the swagger of the Sox was flat out intimidating, the words he used were "they're so big, you got Konerko, Thome, AJ, Crede, it just keeps coming and I told my buddy next to me these friggin guys are gonna win the World Series.....AGAIN!!" I really miss THAT Sox team..... Once I saw us down 3 runs today early, I automatically could feel the offense would do absolutely nothing to challenge and that's how the game ended, so people pls stop the talk about how we can "score with the best of em if only our pitching would come around" We're going to live and die by offense this year, plain and simple and if ours doesn't do what on paper it should, then yes, the season will end with the reg. season.

QUOTE(Jordan4life_2006 @ Aug 21, 2006 -> 05:09 PM) Can't we just all get along? Go check out a Yankees or Red Sox board when they're not going well. That kills anything that ever goes on around here. Yeah, here's a sample http://forums.espn.go.com/espn/thread?foru...PostID=27073662

QUOTE(whitesoxfan101 @ Aug 21, 2006 -> 02:15 PM) The 2005 World Series is done. That Championship is something to savor during the offseason, and if you want to use that glorious season as a reason to be satisfied with underachieving and not winning anything now or in the future, than I don't want you in our fanbase. I feel your frustration but.........the guy has a point that we are tied for the WC lead and still 22 games over 500, it would have been a different story if we were 10 games out of the playoffs and playing 500 ball through the season, in which case yes this would have been a total letdown of a year. This is not ideal, but we're still in it, anything can happen, and we have the talent to pull it off, the POV is not conceding defeat just saying this is a tough part of the year for everyone, every team has their issues, and we hope our aren't enough to keep us out of it. Minny lost Liriano for God's sake, we're lucky we didn't lose anyone for the season. A week with 5 of 6 against Det and NY and we were all singing praises, a down week and the world's over. But in the coming week we could go 6 for 6 and Minnesota could lose six straight......probable, maybe not, but possible...

QUOTE(SleepyWhiteSox @ Aug 20, 2006 -> 04:38 PM) THE THREE REASONS WHY WE STRUGGLE THIS YEAR: 1. Buehrle 2. Javy 3. Freddy ding, ding, ding......think of all the games we could have pulled out 5-4, 3-2, 2-1 if we had pitching that wasn't automatic for a blowup inning. Today Javy's was the 3rd and from there we had a large hole for the offense to climb out of, assuming the pitchers don't give up even one more run for the next 6 innings Santana's last 10, the guy just doesn't lose that much, and when he does it's on the road and his team scores Start Log DATE OPP RESULT IP H R ER HR BB SO GB FB TBF #Pit Dec. Rel. ERA 8/15 Cle W 4-1 8.0 3 0 0 0 1 9 5 11 27 99 W(14-5) -- 3.10 8/9 @Det W 4-3 7.0 4 3 3 1 2 10 8 4 27 110 W(13-5) -- 3.24 8/4 @KC W 8-5 6.0 4 4 4 0 3 8 7 4 25 99 -- -- 3.22 7/30 Det W 6-4 5.1 9 3 3 0 4 2 12 4 28 105 -- -- 3.11 7/25 @CWS W 4-3 7.0 7 3 3 2 0 6 12 5 27 106 W(12-5) -- 3.04 7/20 TB W 6-4 6.0 6 3 3 1 4 7 1 6 26 101 W(11-5) -- 3.00 7/15 Cle W 6-2 7.0 5 2 2 1 0 7 6 9 26 92 W(10-5) -- 2.93 7/9 @Tex L 2-5 7.0 7 5 5 2 1 7 8 7 29 94 L(9-5) -- 2.95 7/3 @KC W 6-5 5.2 6 5 4 0 3 7 8 3 25 103 -- -- 2.76 6/28 LAD W 6-3 7.0 2 0 0 0 3 9 4 7 26 105 W(9-4) -- 2.59 Complete Game Log

QUOTE(FlaCWS @ Aug 13, 2006 -> 06:21 PM) I'm surprised. Clearly I'm in the vast minority here but I root for Detroit. I know it's nice to say "division champs" but to me the most important thing is making the playoffs. We have a great shot at Detroit but when it comes to the wildcard we control our destiny. We are ahead of Boston and the more space we put between us, the closer we are to guaranteeing the PLAYOFFS which is the important thing. Now that Liriano is done, Minny doesn't scare me, so Boston is the primary wildcard contender. If we sweep KC (which I expect) and Detroit sweeps Boston, we'll be 5 up in the wildcard. This is precisely why I started the thread, it's a lot easier to build on an existing lead than hope to take one that's still a ways off and then hold it until the end......we might find ourselves 1 gm behind Detroit in the central and a 1/2 gm behind Boston in the WC on the last day, wishing that Detroit had won just one extra game in the Det/Bos series starting tomorrow.

right now we're 6.5 games behind Detroit and 2 ahead of Boston the in WC Don't get me wrong, I'd love to win the division, but does anyone think our chance of the WC over a Boston team that we're already ahead of and has both a questionable pitching staff and hitting outside of 3-4 much better than gaining and keeping the lead and the central. Right now, Boston losing three to Detroit and us winning 4 against KC puts us 5.5 ahead of them!! Whereas three Detroit losses and 4 wins by us, still has us at best 2 games behind Detroit, assuming we even win today. Might be defeatest thinking, but time is short.....

A-Row, you keep a postin these until the magic ends...........

QUOTE(Winning Ugly @ Aug 10, 2006 -> 02:50 PM) Man I was thinking about this last night as I watched Thome ground out. I listed the exact four on the list, and man it's almost too close to call really. Tadahito has had some HUGE clutch abs in games this year, as has Paulie and JD, but Crede stands out more. Thome hasn't been clutch for us at all this season. in fact, I don't think he has many RBIs this year that occurred after the 6th inning. I love JT, but the fact is he is the last guy on the entire team I want up wit RISP in late innings........ground outs or whiffs seems automatic

QUOTE(Queen Prawn @ Aug 11, 2006 -> 09:28 AM) LMAO! Wanna know something pathetic? I missed the "onion sports" at the top and thought it was real hahahaha. Is it 5 o'clock yet?! This is the third Sox article they've done since the WS http://www.theonion.com/content/node/42131 http://www.theonion.com/content/node/46905

QUOTE(Kalapse @ Aug 8, 2006 -> 11:56 PM) Johnny Damon would have to be playing 2 steps behind the the bag at second to have any chance with that noodle arm. Damon is atop the list of most pathetic OF arms in all of baseball, he's right there with Rondell White and Juan Pierre. ummmmm, might want to add a certain south side left fielder to that list!!!!

this so speaks the the story of why we've fallen so hard the 2nd half. If you're going to bring a guy in to face two batters(thorton) you cannot cannot cannot cannot walk one of them, especially with the lineup behind them

and you know Detroit's gonna pull out a freaking win on the day they score 1 run!!

got the DVR all set out here in SoCal!! Best part for us out of towners is that three of these are in HD, since we don't get WGN HD out of the Chgo area I can attest first hand that we are well well below .500 on natl TV, because they seem to lose every time I get to watch them live, it's uncanny. Yesterday's WGN game was the first live winner I've seen in a long while

which season did we blow a 5 game lead on MN in like one week? I'm as pessimistic as anyone with what we've seen the past month, but a huge chunk of games really can change over in a heartbeat. Detroit was within one inning of giving two whole games back to us on consecutive days.....and to their credit pulled it out against CL's pathetic bullpen. Gain one more game on them to take it to five, and a sweep head to head brings it to two......now of course none of this has happened....yet....but it's not too far fetched. We have our own mountain to climb with NY and Boston coming up....but still, in the next two months we absolutely can take this division

1, they made a physical change to his delivery which might be effective in it's own right, but might be mentally effective to him as THE thing that worked, like a cap that hasn't been washed in two seasons or Meat wearing ladies underpants in Bull Durham, as long as he believes it's the magic bullet that all that counts 2, watching Ozzie, he, Freddy joke in the dugout after was great to see, Javy must be more relaxed after climbing that hump and being able to finally joke with the mgr about something he's been struggling to do for 3 months. 3, gotta believe he feels relieved of some massive pressure, simply for showing he could in fact do what people have been saying he couldn't....personally I'm expecting a whole new Javy from here on out

QUOTE(southsideirish71 @ Aug 5, 2006 -> 11:32 AM) He looked nasty last night. He was getting his curve and slider over and was throwing 98 and he struck out 3. The ball Glaus hit, you tip your hat to that. The pitch was 98, up and away. I actually thought I saw the "hammer" drop down, but Troy simple pick it up from down low and send it out to center, looked the perfect version of that pitch that Glaus just did a great job with

QUOTE(GreatScott82 @ Aug 5, 2006 -> 09:57 PM) man screw Cleveland and thier low budget relievers! We should be only 6 games back damn it! No Sh*t!!! There's a world of difference between 8 and 6 at this point of the season, but you have to tip your hat to Detroit, they just keep rolling on......hoping the collapse they've been due for comes like a freight train in Sept....

QUOTE(The Ginger Kid @ Aug 5, 2006 -> 06:41 PM) DUDE, you're a genius! Yes, where will we finish the season while you're at it?

http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sp...-home-headlines

QUOTE(BobDylan @ Aug 4, 2006 -> 04:53 PM) Make all the line-up changes you want...Scott Podesnik is not the problem to this team. Nor is Javier Vazquez. It's the whole damned team. This is the accurate 10,000 foot view, all the tactical changes in the world boil down to a team that is just not really fighting or believing, sometimes the chemistry just comes together and plows through all obstacles, like we did last year, and so far Detroit is doing this year (note their 7 run comeback in the last 4 innings last night, and note the swagger on Craig Monroe after his homerun, and the screaming face of Pudge as he scored, and the elation in the crowd after--both things we saw a whole bunch of last season). I can't remember the last time I saw that fist pumping celebration at the plate or in the dugout, or swagger on the field w/ this clubhouse---I just see a group of guys who don't seem incredibily connected, gelled, bonded, or whatever words you choose to use--last year we "felt" like something special, this year we feel just like another team with talent.....and if talent is the metric, then we've got our hands full trying to with the WC against NY, BOS or MN Remember Thome's first HR in the rain against Cleveland, or Iguchi's 9th inning GS against Houston, or Cintron's 3run jack in the 8th? We need some moments like this to bring this team a little bit closer, and with chemistry and bonding great things happen

YES

wow.....just still blows me away how a team, this team, who had so much promise to repeat, who was FLAT OUT RUNNING AWAY with the division and wild card spot along with Detroit, has sunken into such misery........all the staples of last year that brought them their identity, are gone, and once you get to the point of players being benched for lack of effort, you know you're hitting bottom.....how I ask how did this happen?

Rowand would never have let this mess happen, not in his clubhouse, not on his watch!!

on the bright side we just took the WC lead over a team that gave up NINETEEN runs to tampa bay, and we'll see if Minn comes down to earth if they get swept by Detroit. There's no reason to expect NY to cruise from here on out, so even playing 600 ball we could, possibly, end up making the playoffs

QUOTE(WHarris1 @ Jul 29, 2006 -> 07:03 PM) And why wouldn't they? Since when does 1 game change anything? For a team in a situation like ours, one game means a great deal, they're trying to pull out of a major major slump and losing what looks to be a runaway win for a two game streak, could destroy what little confidence they're building